The tragedy of childbed fever
نویسنده
چکیده
contamination and perhaps towards women. Plague and leprosy also increased fears of contamination and contagion, and encouraged the association of bodily affliction with moral corruption, although the link between leprosy and "sexual depravity" was not as "inextricable" as the authors assert. But there were many other reasons for changing attitudes towards deviance, sin and the body, and for new public and private efforts to control them, in the later Middle Ages and the sixteenth century. Popular disorder might be influential, as the authors admit in the particular case of Florence, and urbanization and economic developments need more space than they are given here. Above all, much more needs to be said about Christianity as it evolved in its various forms across the period, determining perceptions of gender, corruption and much else besides. To hold epidemic disease responsible for wholesale cultural transformation, as the authors largely do, is to fail to discriminate between multiple causes, some large, some small, in complex historical situations. No amount of cultural theory will make up for that lack of understanding of historical context.
منابع مشابه
Scientific Inquiry:
As a simple illustration of some important aspects of scientific inquiry let us consider Semmelweis' work on childbed fever. Ignaz Semmelweis, a physician of Hungarian birth, did this work during the years from 1844 to 1848 at the Vienna General Hospital. As a member of the medical staff of the First Maternity Division in the hospital, Semmelweis was distressed to find that a large proportion o...
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متن کاملThe Etiology, Concept, and Prophylaxis of Childbed Fever
Medicine’s highest duty is saving threatened human life, and obstetrics is the branch of medicine in which this duty is most obviously fulfilled. Frequently it is necessary to deliver a child in transverse lie. Mother and child will probably die if the birth is left to nature, while the obstetrician’s timely helping hand, almost painlessly and taking only a few minutes, can save both . I was al...
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عنوان ژورنال:
- Medical History
دوره 45 شماره
صفحات -
تاریخ انتشار 2001